


By Proxy

by DictionaryWrites



Series: Patrician & Clerk [2]
Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Age Difference, Anal Fingering, Asexual Character, Celibacy, Class Differences, Complicated Relationships, Dom/sub, First Time, Lack of Communication, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Power Dynamics, Power Imbalance, Under-negotiated Kink, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-06
Updated: 2019-02-06
Packaged: 2019-10-23 15:14:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17685905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DictionaryWrites/pseuds/DictionaryWrites
Summary: “Who is he?” Drumknott asks, but he doesn’t turn his head, doesn’t look of his own accord. He knows without being told that that would be an overstep, that he oughtn’t do that, and Vetinari’s icy gaze bores into his.“An… assistant from the Entertainment District,” Vetinari murmurs. “His name, his face, don’t matter. I believe I told you, Drumknott, when you joined my service, that you were an extension of me. You serve, I believe I said, as an additional limb, an additional organ.”“Yes,” Drumknott says.“Think of it like that,” Vetinari purrs.





	By Proxy

After a few years in the Patrician’s Palace, Drumknott is used to acting to defend himself.

He has taken tutelage from the Dark Clerks, a near-mythical concept within the city of Ankh-Morpork itself – the Dark Clerks, the Patrician’s secondary force of clerks who serve to perform acts of espionage, are educated in a wide variety of violent techniques, and Drumknott is among their number in that regard.

Then, of course, there is the matter of his more… _personal_ tutelage, in that arena.

Lord Vetinari is a man who enjoys games of strategy – he enjoys such games as chess and Thud; he enjoys complicated card games and board games; he enjoys puzzles and riddles, enjoys cryptography.

Lord Vetinari also, Drumknott has learned since entering his service, enjoys attempts made on his life. He all but encourages would-be assassins to approach him, on the Palace grounds or elsewhere, and he ordinarily eliminates them with a good deal of speed and aplomb, but he likes the challenge of it, Drumknott thinks. It is… It is, at times, _frustrating_ , the extent to which the Patrician enjoys these attempts on his life.

When Drumknott is within the Patrician’s presence, he need not defend himself. The Patrician will step in, and it is for the best that Drumknott does not appear to be anything of note. He is a small man, under layers of dark fabric, and his spectacles add to the appearance of outward vulnerability – ordinarily, an Assassin wouldn’t kill _him_ because it would be, on some level, dishonourable[1], to kill a vulnerable little man whose importance to the Patrician is in bringing tea and stacks of files.

And when Drumknott is alone…

He is _capable_ of defending himself.

The vast majority of the times, of course, when Drumknott is set upon by an assailant, that assailant is Vetinari himself. It isn’t every day. It is merely enough to keep Drumknott’s reflexes sharp and well-honed – once in a while, Vetinari and Drumknott will spar properly downstairs, will take up shortblades and practice with one another… And Drumknott enjoys it. He hadn’t expected to, in the beginning, but he _does_. There is something exciting in the little spars they have with one another, practising footwork and blade etiquette.

And as for the other…

He and Vetinari’s relationship goes slightly beyond the _professional_.

That is…

This is a fact with which Drumknott is comfortably accustomed. There are rules to the way they conduct themselves – there is a sense of careful propriety, a sense of _expectation_ as to how he holds himself, conducts himself… And Vetinari doesn’t _touch_ him. He touches him in small, subtle ways – Vetinari breathes on his skin, brushes his hands or his neck, grips at his hair once or twice, but for the most part, Drumknott touches himself.

Fastidious and ill-dispensed to the mess of sex, Drumknott doesn’t think Vetinari _likes_ the idea of participating. He enjoys, Drumknott thinks, drawing his reaction out of him, enjoys witnessing Drumknott’s eager response, and he enjoys controlling the way that Drumknott responds so eagerly to that little which Vetinari will give him.

And he wishes, sometimes, he wishes…

He oughtn’t wish, but he wishes, at times, that they might have more. He wishes that he might reach out and touch Lord Vetinari’s hand, when his head is aching and he is forcing himself to concentrate on small text. He wishes, at times, that Vetinari’s appetites ran elsewhere, that Vetinari would pin him down and touch him, _have_ him. He wishes, at times, that he might—

That _he_ might initiate a moment’s affection, although that realm is Vetinari’s, although it is up to him, to lead their dynamic one way or another. Drumknott cannot overstep, in that regard, cannot…

He cannot.

And he oughtn’t wish.

“Will that be all, my lord?” Drumknott asks.

“The Blue Room tonight, Drumknott,” Vetinari says. He doesn’t look up from his correspondence as he says so, and Drumknott doesn’t allow his reaction to show in his face or his body, but the anticipation thrums under his skin. The Blue Room is a room set aside from most of the offices and the working spaces, a drawing room where a piano is set in one corner, and the walls are painted delicate periwinkle blue. It’s an airy room, with furniture against its edges, with a comfortable leather bench set in the centre of it. On some evenings, Drumknott practises at the piano, for the Blue Room is quite soundproofed, and the noise does not carry beyond its walls.

 _No_ sound carries.

“Very well, my lord,” Drumknott says softly, and they go about the last of the evening’s business, setting some of the files back into their cabinets, cleaning up for tomorrow evening’s events. No doubt, Drumknott muses, some wild catastrophe will occur. Such is the nature of things. 

At half past ten o’clock, Drumknott removes his clerk’s robe, hanging it neatly on the rack in the corner. He takes up his briefcase from beside his desk, and he steps from his office, locking it neatly behind him.

Walking with his briefcase at his side, he moves directly down the stairs and toward the drawing room. It is several floors below the Oblong Office, which is set into one of the towers in the Palace, and Drumknott is… _excited_. Their mutual excursions to the Blue Room are not performed with regularity – it is when there is time in the busy week to allow for it… At times, Lord Vetinari will bring Drumknott into his office, will have him sit down and murmur in his ear as he touches himself, will _watch_ him…

Their moments in the Blue Room are more _involved_.

The first time, Vetinari had not warned him in advance, had stepped inside whilst Drumknott was practising some songs from a dwarven opera. He had locked the door, leaned down over Drumknott at the piano, let his fingers dance over Drumknott’s upper arms as he’d concentrated on playing, and he’d watched Drumknott gasp in his place.

After that, an appointment would be made in advance, and sometimes, Vetinari will blindfold him, speak to him quietly as he touches himself or grinds himself down on his hand, sometimes _bind_ him and let him thrust against something… It makes him ache with excitement merely to _think_ , his blood rushing in his veins as he wonders what is in store for him.

It would not be true to say he lives for these moments.

He loves all of his time in the Patrician’s service, throws himself heart and soul into the crucial work they perform for the city at large, enjoys the cryptography, the machinations, the Patrician’s paperwork, even… But _these_ moments, too, he enjoys. He looks forward to these considerations, thinks of them at night, adores…

He sets his hand on the handle of the door of the Blue Room, in which the candles have not yet been lit, and he is aware of the breathing in the darkness as a little of the light in the corridor filters in.

The rumours as to Vetinari’s vampirism are, in Drumknott’s mind, somewhat foolish. When one touches his hands or his face, one can feel the vital _warmth_ of Vetinari’s body; he breathes openly and evenly, and his pale skin tans just slightly in the summer; he is _human_. And yet, with that said, Vetinari moves inhumanly fast.

He dodges when Vetinari lunges for him, but in the darkness he catches his ankle and stumbles on the piano stool, his briefcase clattering to the floor with a leathery _smack_ as Vetinari shoves him up against the back of the door, which clicks shut as he does so. Vetinari’s arm is braced over his chest, putting pressure on his throat.

He’s ordinarily better than this, in sparring with Lord Vetinari, but this is a lesson he has been made aware of in the act of self-defence. One wrong move, one misstep, one trip… And one’s fate is sealed.

Vetinari’s mouth hovers over Drumknott’s, and not for the first time, Drumknott wonders what it might be like to kiss him, what it might be like to feel Vetinari’s mouth beneath his own, feel Vetinari’s sharp tongue, his teeth, feel the drag of his neatly-shaved goatee against Drumknott’s mouth...

Vetinari has no interest in it, he doesn’t think.

But he wishes—

And he oughtn’t wish.

“Sorry,” Drumknott says.

“Quite alright,” Vetinari murmurs. “We don’t usually spar in here: the geography of the room no doubt eluded you in the pitch black. Is your leg alright?” Drumknott feels his breath catch in his throat: there is no especial concern in his voice, but merely the fact that he _asks_ makes Drumknott’s skin feel a little tighter, makes him…

“Yes, my lord,” he says quietly.

“Good,” Vetinari murmurs, and Drumknott is aware—

There is another person in the room. Someone big, and standing to their feet – as big as Vetinari, he thinks, perhaps a little taller, judging on the height the sound of their breathing seems to be coming from, on the other side of the room, and Drumknott feels a slight twinge of fear.

Vetinari’s arm comes away from his chest, and the familiar black cloth of the blindfold is pressed against Drumknott’s eyes, his glasses drawn away. Drumknott feels the way it is tied tightly at the back of his head, and he cannot help the tension in his body even as he feels Vetinari’s fingers run over the front of his suit blazer, unbuttoning, too, his waistcoat.

“My lord?” he asks softly, and some of his anxiety must show in his voice, because Vetinari’s hand touches his _cheek_ , his long, warm fingers touching against the cool expanse of the skin there, and he leans in, his lips dragging over the line of Drumknott’s cheekbone, and Drumknott can’t help the way he shudders in a gasp.

“Do you trust me?” Vetinari asks softly. Drumknott’s chest _aches_ , and he keeps his hands clenched tightly at his sides, not allowing himself to cross the boundary between them, not letting himself reach out to touch Lord Vetinari back, when it is not his place to do so.

“With anything, my lord,” he whispers, and Vetinari is close enough that he can feel the shift of Vetinari’s mouth against his skin as he smiles. He could _swoon_.

“Good,” Vetinari says, and he gently draws Drumknott’s jacket from his shoulders. He’s unfailingly gentle with Drumknott, every time: he has strong hands, snaps necks with regularity, with ease, but with Drumknott, he can be so _careful_. Even when he’s flipping a blade in his hand and dragging the flat against Drumknott’s neck, even when he _cuts_ him during a spar, nicks the skin to score a point, it is gentle.

Drumknott’s waistcoat is drawn away too, and then Vetinari’s hands move over his shirt. Vetinari likes to undress him. He doesn’t always, but he likes, Drumknot thinks, the way he can lean in to unfasten the clothes – it isn’t about being _close_ to Drumknott, but about controlling these little aspects… It is the control, he thinks, that Vetinari likes most of all, and Drumknott is happy to give up control, happy to give it all up, if it will make Vetinari come this close, touch him quite so intimately.

“Sit,” Vetinari orders, his voice low, and Drumknott allows himself to be pushed back onto the leather couch. It occurs to him, not for the first time, with a shivery sensation that drags up his spine, that in moments like these, Vetinari is… _Gentle_ , but firm, in the way he is with the dog, and Drumknott doesn’t think he _realizes_ it, the parallel, but—

Vetinari’s fingers make short work of the laces on Drumknott’s boots, easing them off his feet, and then he reaches up, unfastening Drumknott’s trousers and reaching beneath to unfasten his breeches. Drumknott is half-hard already, excited despite himself, and Vetinari drags the heel of his palm over the bulge beneath the fabric, and Drumknott can’t help the stuttered moan he releases.

“The candles, would you?” he hears Vetinari ask, even as Vetinari taps a finger against Drumknott’s hip for him to lift his backside from the bench, and he draws his trousers and breeches each off. He can feel the momentary coolness as Vetinari draws away to fold the trousers and set them aside, and he hears the flick of a match, but behind the blindfold, he isn’t aware of a huge difference in the light about him. The blindfold is thick – he can’t so much as see the shadows of the others in the room.

 _Others_.

Not just Vetinari, but another person, _another person_ , and Drumknott doesn’t know how he feels about it, isn’t sure—

“Do you want to keep these on?” Vetinari asks, and his finger brushes against the clip of the garter keeping his sock up, on his left leg. The touch is featherlight, and Drumknott exhales. His circulation is terrible, leaving him with eternally cold feet and hands – that is why he asks.

“Yes, please, my lord.”

“Very well,” Vetinari says, and his hands draw away. “Take hold of him.”

Drumknott is aware of hands touching him – big hands, _soft_ hands – not like Vetinari’s, defined and slender and deceptively strong, but big, meaty hands, and he stiffens as they touch against his shoulder.

“Go on, Drumknott,” Vetinari murmurs, his tone playful. “Struggle.”

There is a time where grace and a smaller size proves… _Useful_. Certainly, with the average assassin, Drumknott has made use of his smaller size to send bigger men falling over themselves, has used their own strength against them, but this only goes so _far_. This man is huge, at least as big, Drumknott thinks, as Captain Carrot, and as he tries to drag himself away and dodge out of his grip, the man _drags_ his arms, behind his back, pins him down hard against the bench, on his belly.

The man is undressed, and Drumknott can feel the hair on his legs as he leans right over him, puts knees either side of Drumknott’s legs to keep him pinned, and as he leans in, Drumknott can feel the man’s member in his breeches, feel it hard against his bare buttocks. He can’t help the ragged noise he makes, the way he tries to struggle in his place to wrench himself free: fear bursts hot in his blood, and then there is a strong hand on his chin, and the blindfold is being drawn away.

He blinks in the low candlelight, looks at Vetinari’s face.

“What—” Drumknott asks, and he leans into the hand cupping his chin.

“Do you trust me?” Vetinari asks again.

“Who is he?” Drumknott asks, but he doesn’t turn his head, doesn’t look of his own accord. He knows without being told that that would be an overstep, that he _oughtn’t_ do that, and Vetinari’s icy gaze bores into his.

“An… _assistant_ from the Entertainment District,” Vetinari murmurs. “His name, his face, don’t matter. I believe I told you, Drumknott, when you joined my service, that you were an extension of _me_. You serve, I believe I said, as an additional limb, an additional organ.”

“Yes,” Drumknott says, and he feels the tailor’s _member_ , feels it a fat weight against his flesh, scarcely contained by the fabric of his breeches, and Drumknott’s breathing is running fast.

“Think of it like that,” Vetinari purrs. The tailor, then, is to be Lord Vetinari’s proxy, and Drumknott… Vetinari’s fingers play against the underside of his chin, and Drumknott inhales. The air in the Blue Room is cold on his naked skin, although the tailor’s skin is warm against his own. He isn’t certain. He doesn’t know, is uncertain about it, a stranger touching him, even under Vetinari’s behest, even under his control: he trusts Vetinari, but not the tailor, he trusts—

Vetinari’s mouth presses against Drumknott’s own, one of his hands curling in Drumknott’s hair, and Drumknott gasps against his lips. _Years_. Three years since they started this, three years since he joined his lordship’s service, and he has dreamt of Vetinari kissing him, dreamt of Vetinari pinning him down and kissing him, dreamt of the warmth of Vetinari’s tongue against his own, and this is _so much better_. Vetinari kisses smoothly, well-practised and with delicacy that makes Drumknott’s head spin, his lips quiver under Vetinari’s own, and he can feel Vetinari’s goatee, feel his teeth where they drag over Drumknott’s bottom lip, threatening to bite down. Drumknott moans, and the sound is muffled by Vetinari’s mouth as he leans back.

It’s a manipulation. Plain as day, plain as the nose on Drumknott’s face: Vetinari just _kissed_ him, and he can feel his lips plump and flushed with blood from the kiss, and Vetinari’s done it all so he’ll agree, all so he’ll—

Drumknott’s body has relaxed where the tailor pins him in his place, he realises. He wants Vetinari to kiss him again, _wants_ , aches, and his member is hard beneath him, pinned between his body and the bench.

“Ready?” Vetinari asks.

Drumknott hesitates. “Yes,” he says, although he isn’t certain he is, and Vetinari _smiles_ , looks so pleased that Drumknott’s heart skips a beat in his chest, and he feels like he might faint. Vetinari’s hands come up once more, neatly tying the blindfold back over Drumknott’s eyes.

It isn’t a tailor.

It isn’t.

There is no stranger behind him: there is only _Vetinari_.

“You haven’t done this before, have you, Drumknott?” Vetinari asks, and Drumknott relaxes as the hands on his wrists relax their grip, and then the big hands drag up the surface of his back, the fingers dragging over the muscle toward his shoulders. He grunts as the thumbs dig into the taut muscle there, massaging the corded knots of tissue.

“No, my lord,” he whispers.

“Do you often think of it?”

“Yes.”

“Of me?”

“Yes.”

“I see.” The hands are working at the muscle, and he is aware, in this moment, of precisely how _stiff_ his shoulders are. His posture is good, as a rule, but he is occasionally aware of the twinges there, the tension in his body, and the hands feel—

 _Good_.

“And like this, Drumknott, what would you want me to do to you?”

Drumknott swallows. “I…”

“You are usually so erudite, Drumknott,” Vetinari murmurs, and the proxy’s thumbs dig into the back of Drumknott’s neck, and Drumknott _moans_ as the hot sensation of uncoiling tension pours down his spine, and grinds his member against the back of Drumknott’s— Drumknott’s breath hitches, and he hears Vetinari chuckle quietly. “Does your intellect fail you now?”

The proxy’s fingers drag down toward his buttocks, and Drumknott shudders as his fingers trace either side of his spine, dipping into the cleft there, and Drumknott can’t help the way that he whimpers, his knees pressed tightly together, his thighs drawn up tightly.

“I… My lord, I don’t find it _easy_ to speak under—” The proxy slides two fingers right over the dry pucker of his entrance, pressing down on the tight muscle, and Drumknott chokes. “ _Pressure_.”

“I’ve noticed that,” Vetinari says, as the proxy rubs a slow circle against his entrance, and Drumknott is _hard_ , his member pressed against the bench, and he cannot help the way his hips shift, the way he grinds slightly against the leather beneath him. “But you disappoint me, Drumknott. I so enjoy to hear your _euphonious_ descriptions of your fantasies.”

He hears the shift of fabric as Vetinari moves his arm, and the proxy drags him up from the hips.

“On your knees and elbows, Drumknott,” Vetinari murmurs, and Drumknott swallows hard as he drops into place. He has imagined it, this much is true – he’s imagined Vetinari pinning him down against his desk in the Oblong Office, driving into Drumknott so hard he can scarcely breathe; he’s imagined Vetinari lifting him against the wall, Drumknott’s wrists pinned above his head and his legs wrapped around Vetinari’s waist; once, just once, he’s imagined Vetinari coming for him in his bed, his fingers playing over Drumknott’s chest as he takes him gently, hips rolling against Drumknott’s…

He never imagined _this_.

“Tell me,” Vetinari murmurs, and Drumknott presses his fingers into the leather bench beneath him, doing his best to focus on breathing evenly.

“I hate this part,” Drumknott says, and Drumknott’s thighs quiver as the proxy’s palms slide over his backside, and his member is hard between his legs. When the proxy’s hand slips beneath his body, palming the length of it, Drumknott grunts, his hips stuttering. Vetinari likes to make him _talk_ , and he never can, never can talk properly when he’s undressed and overstimulating, and Vetinari _laughs_ at him… And it makes his skin flush, makes him hot all over, arouses him beyond measure. “It’s humiliating.”

“That’s rather the point,” Vetinari says. The proxy’s hand comes down abruptly against his buttock, so hard the sound of it rings in the room, and the pain makes his skin _sing_ , burning hot and jolting him on the bench. He can feel his member swing underneath him, and the pain is _incredible_ , sends electric bursts right down the length of it. “You turn such a _charming_ colour upon humiliation.”

The proxy’s hand wraps tightly around Drumknott, and Drumknott heaves in a gasp. “I wish—” He cuts himself off with a moan when the proxy’s hand twists to the side, screwing his eyes tightly shut behind the blindfold.

“You wish?” Vetinari repeats, his tone quietly expectant.

“I wish I could touch you,” Drumknott gasps out, and when the proxy drags a slick finger over his entrance, and he _can’t_. He presses his face down against the bench, his length twitching, and he can feel his excitement coiling in his belly like a stapler’s spring, feel himself _ache_.

“Do you?” Vetinari asks, wryly, and Drumknott nods his head. “How?”

“Kiss you,” Drumknott whispers, scarcely daring to do more than breathe the words against the leather bench: the proxy’s finger teases inward, just slightly, and he feels the tight muscle give way, feels the strange _pressure_ as one of those soft fingers presses in. “Kiss your, _ah_ , your neck, your… Your chest. I like the— Your chest hair.”

“How flattering.”

“I don’t want to— I know you don’t… I don’t— _Ungh._ ” The proxy’s finger slides in, the movement so easy Drumknott can barely _stand_ it, and he feels himself clench around it, even as the other hand plays with his member, keeps up those regular, twisting fists over the length of his— “Is he going to…?”

“Is he going to what, Drumknott?” Vetinari asks, and then the proxy’s finger presses _down_ , against… Drumknott sees _stars_ , and the noise he lets out is a desperate whimper as he falls against the bench: his member is jumping between his legs, and he can feel the _pulse_ as his sac draws up tight, feel his orgasm shock through him like a wildfire. He is moaning, he is distantly aware – babbling out pure noise and unable to reason with his unthinking tongue, and the Patrician is right.

Any _sense_ of erudition is gone from him in moments like this, and as he breathes heavily, the proxy stroking him through it, he exhales heavily when his chin is pulled up, and Lord Vetinari’s palm moves to cup his cheek, his touch _warm_ in the cold room.

“Do not presume to know what it is I want,” Vetinari says quietly, his voice crisp. His thumb lingers on Drumknott’s cheek, stroking back and forth over the bone there. Drumknott feels a complicated emotion twist in his stomach, a desperate, deep-set _yearning_ , assailed by guilt, and _need_ —

“I want only to please you, my lord,” Drumknott mumbles, and he is shameless: he presses his face into the touch, feels Vetinari’s slim fingers.

“You do,” Vetinari replies, so sternly that for a moment, Drumknott stiffens, and then he processes what Vetinari has _said_. He leans in closer, and once more his mouth drags over Drumknott’s skin, makes him shudder in his place. “I should like to see you had tonight, Drumknott,” Vetinari murmurs in his ear, his nose brushing against Drumknott’s hair, their faces cheek-to-cheek, with Vetinari still holding him on the other side, and Drumknott swallows hard. “Does that meet with your approval?”

“If it would please you, my lord,” Drumknott says. “I want— That.”

“So concerned with propriety, even naked like this, sweat-slick and with your own spend beneath you?”

Drumknott swallows. “Propriety is important, my lord.”

“As ever, Drumknott, I am in awe at your decorum,” Vetinari murmurs. “As we give you a moment, then, tell me: how do you wish I would touch you?”

“You don’t want to,” Drumknott says.

“Don’t I?” Vetinari asks. Drumknott can feel the neat trim of his beard against the side of his face, feel the astonishing heat Vetinari gives off, and he exhales as Vetinari’s fingers curl in his hair. “I’m touching you now, am I not?”

“I wish you would kiss me,” Drumknott says. As soon as he says the words, Vetinari’s head is turning, and once more, he feels the brush of Vetinari’s lips against his own, feels Vetinari kiss him deeply, and Drumknott’s head is _spinning_ as he leans eagerly into it, gasps into Vetinari’s mouth.

They break apart, and Drumknott breathes heavily, still feeling Vetinari’s fingers on his cheek.

“One wish,” Vetinari murmurs. “Granted.”

“Are you a djinn now, my lord?”

“Is that one of your fantasies?”

Drumknott’s lips shift into a smile, and he turns his head, drags his lips over the Patrician’s palm. For a moment, he’s frozen, wondering if this was the wrong thing to do, if he had overstepped: Vetinari is utterly silent, and Drumknott holds his breath. He wishes, sometimes, that it could be different. He wishes…

Vetinari’s fingers play over his cheek once more, and then he draws it away.

“On your back, I think,” Vetinari murmurs. “That I might see you better.”

“Yes, my lord,” Drumknott says softly, and when he falls onto his back a moment later, he finds that a towel has been laid out beneath him, that he not lie in his own mess. He tips his head back, and he feels long fingers draw through his hair.

The touch is tender, and he might almost imagine…

“No more wishes, Drumknott?” Vetinari asks softly, as if reading his train of thought, and Drumknott wonders, for a moment, if he might _say_. If he might say, I wish for _more_. I wish we could sit together and I wish that I could _touch_ you, lean into you, I wish I could hold your hand—

“No, my lord,” Drumknott replies.

Vetinari must know he’s lying – he always does – but he doesn’t say so. His fingers grip a little tighter in his hair, and he drags Drumknott’s head back, forces him to reveal a little more of his neck.

“Very good,” he murmurs, and Drumknott shivers as two hands push his thighs apart, lubricated fingers sliding once more to the cleft between them. Vetinari’s grip remains tight in his hair, and Drumknott feels like he could melt in it.

 **♔** **☩** **♔** **☩** **♔** **☩** **♔**

He doesn’t enjoy kissing.

He never has – he doesn’t like the wetness of it, doesn’t see the exciting part about one’s tongue wet against someone else’s, feeling their lips on your own. He doesn’t enjoy the act of kissing, and it isn’t one he will subject himself to regularly, not even for Drumknott’s sake, but…

He has kissed him twice, this evening, and each time, his body lights up as if Vetinari has struck a match against his wick: his shoulders slacken, his body opening up, and he looks to Vetinari so _eagerly_ , so trustingly, and there is an almost uncomfortable depth of emotion dragging at his chest. Vetinari has dismissed the tailor, and Drumknott is breathing slowly, looking…

He looks all but obliterated, his flesh a mess of bruises and scratches, his legs still fallen open, his skin asheen with sweat. Vetinari reaches down, and he draws the blindfold away. Exhaustedly, he looks up at Vetinari, and Vetinari sets his hands either side of his head, leaning in toward him.

How gratifying, what a _pleasure_ it is, to see the slight dilation of his pupils, to see him so _eager_ , when Vetinari has watched him come apart thrice tonight, and when he must be _sore_ … He doesn’t enjoy kissing. Not for its own sake.

But Drumknott is…

Drumknott has become something different. Had he not, Vetinari would not have invested all the time, the effort, in selecting a trustworthy individual from the tailor’s guild, would not have bothered. Drumknott has become something _crucial_ , and Vetinari wants to give him some things. Not everything Drumknott might want – there are limits to what Vetinari can allow for – but he can give him some things.

Give him…

 _Something_.

“Once more,” he murmurs. “The last time.”

He watches something change in Drumknott’s eyes: excitement flares, and then gives way to uncertainty, to hesitation. “The last?” he repeats.

“For now,” Vetinari allows, and Drumknott’s hesitation eases. He reaches up, cupping Vetinari’s cheeks with both his hands (they are sweaty, and he hates the sensation against his bare skin, _hates_ it, but they are mercifully not so cold as usual), and leans up to kiss him. He allows Drumknott to control the kiss this time, and Drumknott kisses him shyly, meekly, but then seems to gain a surge of confidence, and he does as Vetinari had done in the first instance, dragging his teeth over Vetinari’s lower lip.

It had made Drumknott spasm in pleasure. Vetinari thinks it feels silly.

Vetinari leans away, and he watches as Drumknott reaches up, rubbing at one eye with the back of the knuckle on his thumb, watches the younger man stifle a yawn. “I suppose I can’t sleep here, can I?” he asks.

“No,” Vetinari replies, with a small smile, and as Drumknott towels himself off, he reaches for Drumknott’s shirt and his trousers. He enjoys the process of dressing Drumknott as much as he does the process of undressing him, if not more: there is something enticing in the way he relaxes at having Vetinari so close to him, in the way he leans in, as if Vetinari is doing something much more tender. His hands can linger on Drumknott like this. He finds there is a certain pleasure in touching Drumknott, even though Drumknott won’t reach for him in kind, even in these little encounters…

Propriety traps them both.

As he draws Drumknott’s cravat around his neck, tying it neatly in place, he smiles, smoothing out the fabric. Drumknott has a faraway look in his tired eyes, and Vetinari wonders what it might be like to have him asleep in his bed. A stupid thought, perhaps, a banal one, but he has seen Drumknott sleeping before, has seen the peace on his slack features whilst in sleep…

But there are things he cannot allow for. There are lines he cannot cross – there are matters of impropriety he ought allow in their entirety.

Not unless Drumknott—

“No more wishes?” Vetinari asks a second time.

“No, my lord,” Drumknott says.

No, then.

“Thank you,” Drumknott says quietly. Vetinari smiles, in a distant way, and he blows the candle out before they leave.

 

[1] This, of course, is excepting the few Assassins that have come to the Patrician’s Palace, unsuccessfully, in order to inhume Drumknott himself.

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up [on Dreamwidth](https://dictionarywrites.dreamwidth.org/2287.html). Requests always open.
> 
> I run a [Discworld Comm](https://onthedisc.dreamwidth.org/), and there's also [a Discord right here.](https://discord.gg/b8Z3ThH)


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